The empty hulls of large warehouses and vacant lots are common here, too, remnants of companies that moved or went out of business.

But the city and some developers see the potential for adding residential and commercial development.

Developer Kevin McGowan said his company, McGowan/Walsh, owns several groupings of old warehouses, just north of the site where Pinnacle Entertainment Inc. plans to build a $400 million casino, hotel and mixed-use complex on Laclede's Landing.

"Our plans are to put residential there," McGowan said. "But for now, we're taking a wait and see what happens with the area and the buildings along Broadway and east down to the river."

Stan Meoli said he almost sold his building at 2000 North Broadway last year. He runs American Warehouse, a shipping and receiving company that also leases storage and selling space in its 160,000-square-foot building to other companies. He's waiting now to cash in on the area's potential growth.

"We decided to hold onto the building when they said we'd have to update the sprinkler system for about $30,000" in order to sell it, Meoli said. "With everything going on downtown, if we sell it, it will be for $850,000."

The Missouri and Illinois transportation departments have proposed a new bridge to span the Mississippi River. It will cut a huge swath through several blocks of businesses in the area.

Barbara Geisman, deputy mayor for development, said "the area between the highway and the new bridge would be mixed-use going south, with new retail, office, and business and industrial continuing north."

Even with construction of the bridge, there still would be room to expand, said Carol Perry, president of the North Broadway Business Association.

"We have roughly about 110 businesses as part of the association, and most have indicated they want to grow and acquire more land in the area," Perry said.

That includes Anthony Tocco, president of M&L Foods Inc., who's looking to buy property next to his business at 1717 North Broadway. The company moved to its present location in 1985 after being displaced by construction of America's Center. Now, the food distributor sits in the path of the proposed bridge.

More recently, businesses have moved to the area for its large warehouse spaces, inexpensive land and easy access to transportation routes.

In search of more space, Walter and Marti Hauck moved their company, Zymo Sculpture Studio Inc., to 1520 North Broadway from the Central West End five years ago.

"It's been an interesting neighborhood to watch," said Marti Hauck, who handles the administrative side of the business while her husband sculpts and molds. "The area feels separate from downtown. But when you see the Arch, you definitely know where you are and you realize all the projects going on (downtown) aren't that far away."

Jack and Scott Larrison said they felt that someday, the downtown renaissance would creep farther north, so they bought two dilapidated buildings on North Broadway.

For 15 months, they gutted the insides, salvaging old wood from Mexican cedar, mahogany and maple fence posts left in the buildings to build a bar and adjacent garage. In September, they opened Shady Jack's at 1432 North Broadway.

"The area is up and coming, there's a lot of great potential here and we see it coming this way," Scott Larrison said.

Couple is brewing new life into beer factory
By Tavia Evans
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
10/06/2005 A bicyclist passes by the former Centennial Malt House for Schnaider Brewery.

Wendy Hamilton thinks it was the arched entryways in the basement that caught her eye first, wide enough for the horse-drawn wagons that might have passed through the building in the late 19th century. Today, she thinks the space would be perfect for a lower-level wine shop.

Her husband, Paul Hamilton, can envision the views of the Arch and downtown St. Louis' skyline from the future rooftop terrace of a new restaurant - Vingt Dix Sept - the building's address in French.

At the moment, the building at 2017 Chouteau Avenue, bears little resemblance to their visions.

Built in 1876 and formerly home to the Centennial Malt House, it was an annex of the Joseph Schnaider Chouteau Avenue Brewery that lined the block of Chouteau and Mississippi avenues in the 1870s.

The Hamiltons are turning the two-story building into a banquet hall with a rooftop restaurant. Some office and retail space also might go into the 35,000-square-foot building, which they expect to have ready by April.

After several reincarnations, including storage for auto parts and a shade manufacturing company, the structure suffered from years of neglect and has been open to the elements.

It will cost $4 million to renovate the building and make it structurally sound. "The former owner thought we were crazy; he said we should tear it down," Wendy Hamilton said.

The couple has experience handling old structures. The Hamiltons renovated and own 1111 Mississippi, the Lafayette Square restaurant named for its address. It's housed in the former brewery's main building.

The Hamiltons paid $400,000 for the property on Chouteau in April.

Spiegelglass Construction Co. is the general contractor.

National City Bank is financing the project; a mix of state and federal historic tax credits also might help fund it.

With that in mind, the couple has applied for the building to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

"Their restaurant has been successful, and the location and facility they're proposing dovetails nicely with the other projects in the area" said Brian Davies, who brokered the deal for National City.

The building will need new electrical wiring and plumbing. Wooden structural beams made of rare Douglas fir hold up the inside of the building, but many will need to be replaced because of rot from exposure to water and weather.

On the rooftop, the couple say they'll build a deck and repair an L-shaped building that will become part of a French, bistro-style restaurant. An old grain chute, along with pieces of slate, wheels, pipes and parts scattered from a century ago will be incorporated into the building's design, Paul Hamilton said.

But the 129-year-old building is still revealing surprises, such as the bricked-up archways the couple found throughout the structure. A once-hidden tunnel in the basement leads to a bricked-up wall under Chouteau Avenue. The Hamiltons believe the tunnel might originally have been at street-level, back when the neighborhood bustled with business at the old brewery.

Opus Development Northwest LLC has another project in the works for the Central West End. This time the Chesterfield-based company is moving forward with plans to construct Park East Lofts, a $20 million, 48-unit condominium residence.

The Park East Lofts will be located on Euclid Avenue, immediately north of Opus' Park East Tower, a luxury 26-story condominium project under construction at Euclid and Laclede avenues.

The loft units will average about 1,000 square feet each, ranging in price from about $250,000 to $450,000, depending on size, said John Pitcher, Opus' director of real estate development. The new building will be no more than six stories tall so that it won't block views from the Park East Tower.

Park East Lofts will include about 8,000 square feet of street-level retail space. Pitcher said he has spoken with some potential tenants.

The city of St. Louis also plans to build and own a public parking garage on the property, Pitcher said.

Opus, which is part of the Minneapolis-headquartered Opus Group of companies, has the site of the Park East Lofts under lease now. The site is owned by the city treasurer's office, but Opus plans to purchase the building air rights, meaning it would hold the rights to build and own anything built on the land, but not the land itself.

Pitcher said Opus would not seek any tax increment financing (TIF) for the residential or retail development. The city could consider a TIF for its own development of the garage, he said.

Pitcher hopes to start building in the spring and expects the project would take about 15 months to complete.

Opus' enthusiasm for additional residential development in the Central West End has been ignited by the early success of the company's $50 million Park East Tower development. More than 80 percent of the high-rise's 89 units already have been sold, though the first condos won't be finished and delivered to buyers for about 12 more months, Pitcher said. Only about 15 units remain available for sale. Units are selling for $250,000 to $1 million.

Opus also is planning a second high-rise residential building just up the street, at the corner of Euclid and Lindell Boulevard. The former local headquarters of the American Heart Association stands vacant there now. That project has a price tag of $92.6 million, but Opus and the city are still hammering out the financial details, including Opus' request for about $9.5 million in TIF.

Dennis Gorg, executive director of the Central West End Business Association, said residential development is evolving so quickly in the neighborhood that it has been tough to accurately track the number of new housing units coming on the market.

"Every day something new seems to be coming on," Gorg said. "The density of the Central West End is growing. Anytime you get more infrastructure -- housing, stores, churches, schools -- you make a neighborhood stronger."

Plans to renovate the downtown public library would include a 300-seat auditorium, an atrium, a cafe and a screening room. Backers hope the $50 million project can respect the building's architectural heritage.

When the St. Louis Public Library turns 100 in seven years, its director hopes it will serve readers like never before.

He plans for the Beaux Arts beauty to add more wireless technology, a 300-seat auditorium and a new plaza for reading, people-watching and drinking coffee.

Its historic ceilings will be restored and humdrum offices moved out. It will offer more space for the public, including bigger areas for genealogy, regional history and children's literature.

And, not least, it'll provide restrooms with 2012's amenities rather than 1912's.

"We want to give the city the cultural centerpiece it deserves," Waller McGuire says.

A man marking his one-year anniversary as executive director this month, McGuire is moving forward on a "concept design study" for the central library - considered one of the most important and architecturally significant buildings in the city.

And there sit the potential land mines:

As downtown's cultural centerpiece, McGuire says, the central library must preserve its architectural heritage. But to serve 21st-century readers, it also needs to meet modern fire and earthquake codes, update technology and welcome new residents.

The cost to restore ceilings, keep the marble and add modern plumbing: perhaps $50 million.

"That price may be a bargain for a city's main library," McGuire says.

The concept

As deputy director under executive director Glen Holt, McGuire helped organize the building or restoration of 12 library branches, with two more to go. Plans to renovate Central Library developed under Holt, who retired last year, but no capital campaign got going. Now, McGuire says he's pushing for a solid date to start renovating the Italian Renaissance building, designed by Cass Gilbert and completed in 1912.

The library's board of directors has approved the design study by Hillier Architecture, based in Princeton, N.J.

Hillier's plans show an atrium and "winter garden" on the north side of the building, facing Locust Street and bustling Washington Avenue, making the building more inviting. When McGuire had lunch at a new restaurant on Washington, he says, a waiter divulged that he thought the building's rear facade, with its tall, narrow windows, looked like "a jail."

Inside the library, plans call for transforming the lackluster ground floor (derided by workers as resembling the "Greyhound bus station") by adding, among other things, a Center for the Reader, cafe bookstore and screening room.

On the main floor, plans include restoring the magnificent ceilings of the fine-arts room (decorative plugs of plaster were taken out in the 1950s for fluorescent lights), the Great Hall and other area. A new computer center might triple the number available. Twenty are in the Great Hall; eventually, there might be 200-300 throughout the building.

The library would keep the same number of books and materials but make more accessible to the public, McGuire says. Old offices and meeting rooms would become rooms for special collections, genealogy and St. Louis history. Staff offices and a parking garage would be built across the street in another building the library owns.

"Right now the building is designed around the research collections," McGuire notes. That was part of the early 20th-century theory of a library. The massive staircase on Olive Street leads readers up into the aristocratic world of art, literature, poetry. Readers of popular fiction and children's books found themselves on the more utilitarian ground floor until they were good enough readers to ascend the marble staircases, McGuire says with a laugh. "We don't think that way anymore."

What he wants is "a whole new, in effect, general-interest, browsing, popular library on the first floor of the building. It will be both convenient and easy-to-use and bright and beautiful."

Lofts aren't the only housing being built downtown
By Tavia Evans
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
11/02/2005The Ely Walker Lofts on Washington Boulevard.

The market for housing in downtown St. Louis is becoming more diverse, offering high-end condominiums, townhouses and finished lofts along with traditional open loft spaces.

Pent-up demand is driving the market, said Jim Cloar, president of Downtown St. Louis Partnership, a nonprofit organization that focuses on improving downtown.

About 9,700 residents live downtown now, he said, and by 2008 that number is expected to bloom to almost 15,000. And they're not just young and single urban dwellers anymore.

Downtown developers are building varied products to meet demand - especially from a growing segment of empty nesters who want less house and upkeep and are interested in a more finished look.

That's part of the idea behind the loft corridor's newest entry, the Ely Walker Lofts at 1520 Washington Avenue. The 365,000-square-foot building is to have 173 lofts with carpeting in some rooms and more plastered and painted interior walls.

All units would include hardwood floors and more finished spaces, a trend away from the concrete floors and open ductwork in lofts built just five years ago along the same block.

The Ely Walker lofts would range from 1,000 to 1,700 square feet. Prices could start at $140,000 and go up to $275,000.

Retail space and a restaurant could occupy 40,000 square feet on the first floor.

"Our product adds to the range of lofts and locations you can now get downtown, and these are more on the softer side," said Paul Giacoletto, director of operations for Orchard Development Group. "That range has helped the market stay stable, with something for everyone who wants to move back to the city."

The absence of high, warehouse-style ceilings and columns made finished condominiums a better choice for the Marquette building, said Steve Smith, president of the Lawrence Group, which is developing that building at Broadway and Olive.

At the 93-year-old Marquette, 82 condominiums and 40 apartments are planned for the former office building, along with about 25,000 square feet of retail space on the first floor. Carpeting and some hardwood floors, along with finished walls and luxury amenities, are part of the $53 million renovation.

A YMCA will continue to occupy two floors, and first-year residents will receive a free, year-long membership.

"We felt there are a lot of people in the metro area who think downtown would be fun, but aren't ready for a loft lifestyle and want a more finished product," Smith said. "This eases them into it."

The Arcade building, under development by Pyramid Construction, is also being marketed as a luxury condominium development, with 140 units under construction at 800 Olive Street.

The differences between housing styles often depends on the building's function in its former life. Washington Avenue had its beginnings as a garment district; later, the area played a major role in dry goods manufacturing. So, many of its building have large floor plates and more depth than standard office buildings.

"Washington Avenue's buildings lend themselves toward lofts, and that's what the market has been interested in," said Matt O'Leary, vice president for commercial development for Pyramid.

"Now we've gotten to a point where we have lofts and more finished spaces. ... People in the suburbs moving downtown want something dramatically different than what they had in Chesterfield, and that means having different finishes and textures to choose from."

But the traditional loft spaces aren't going away. As the market for downtown housing matures, varied home products are likely to be in demand as more residents gravitate to downtown, along with the amenities and services that prospective residents expect.

"The market is nowhere near tapped; we're in a second stage of development now," O'Leary said. "We now meet a broader group who see it as less risky, with more support services and more to offer, and they're ready to come in and be a part of what's becoming a neighborhood."

Three groups make pitches for Chouteau's Landing
Rick Desloge
Three property owners want to transform the neighborhood south of the Gateway Arch into St. Louis' next hot spot. If any of their proposals take off, the area known as Chouteau's Landing could complement Laclede's Landing, and become a second bookend for the Arch grounds.

But the three plans for the area are not entirely compatible.

The trio of competing property owners all hope to take advantage of Chouteau's Landing, which overlooks the Mississippi River. The neighborhood is bordered by Broadway on the west, the Mississippi River on the east, Interstate 64 on the north and Convent Street on the south. The area is close to the new Busch Stadium, though the site also is boxed in on two sides with elevated railroad lines. The frontage facing the Mississippi looks directly at the city's flood wall. The wall and the rail lines will obstruct views for people and businesses on the first four floors, said Dale Ruthsatz, an executive with St. Louis Development Corp., the agency handling the development for the city's Land Clearance for Redevelopment Authority (LCRA).

In partnership with Pinnacle Entertainment Inc., Rodgers Group Development plans to develop a 10-story, 49-unit condominium complex in St. Louis. Located at Laclede's Landing, the development, named Port St. Louis, will overlook the Mississippi River, the Gateway Arch and downtown St. Louis.

The $25 million project represents half of the development investments to which Pinnacle committed in an agreement with the city of St. Louis. Pinnacle agreed to invest a total of $50 million within five years of breaking ground on a nearby hotel-casino complex. Pinnacle CFO Steve Capp told CPN that the two projects will complement each other and the Gateway Arch stylistically, as well as benefit each other. "If you think of the concept of redevelopment in a downtown area, there's a mutual dependence," he said. "Residential, retail and mixed use work together to drive traffic, interest and convenience."

What's more, "We can participate in the upside of the regeneration of some of these areas," Capp said. Though the size of the condominium structure pales alongside Pinnacle's 18-acre plot of land and the $400 million casino-hotel complex going up there, Pinnacle also wants to serve the "latent demand of this kind of (luxury) living in downtown St. Louis," he added. "For us, this is a very important milestone investment in the continuing resurgence of downtown. This is the right scale to get going in St. Louis."

The scale allows Pinnacle and Rodgers Group to maintain exclusivity and introduce luxury, with water views on one side and city views on the other. Rodgers Group Development held an option on the land where the condominiums are going up. The partnership, Capp pointed out, is equal financially and operationally.